…Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted…
It is a most alarming sentence. The Spirit does not lead Him to applause, nor even immediately to miracles, but to hunger. To confrontation. To the lonely arithmetic of forty days.
Adam was tempted in a garden full of abundance. Christ is tempted in a desert stripped of everything.
And where the first man reached for fruit, the Second refuses even bread.
Each day, I read a paragraph from the encyclical Dilexi te and weave a quotation from it into that day’s Lectio Divina.
Memorial in the Grotto of St. Mary’s Cathedral. The inscription says: “In memory of the death of innocence of the victims of clergy sexual abuse. When innocence dies…a life stops. It is essential that we never forget.”
Through your work, your efforts to change unjust social structures or your simple, heartfelt gesture of closeness and support, the poor will come to realize that Jesus’ words are addressed personally to each of them: “I have loved you” (Rev 3:9).
As I reflect on hope — the Centennial pillar for February, when I am tempted to believe my small efforts for those who suffer from our “serious mistake” make no difference, do I remember that through even my simplest gesture of closeness to the poor, Christ may be speaking personally to them — “I have loved you” — and that hope is carried not by grand structures alone but by faithful, loving presence?
2. Meditatio
Yesterday, just before sunset, I made my rounds to the pasture to check on the sheep and their LGD protectors. Mirada, the year-old pup, was not at the usual meeting place in the center. She was cowering in the corner.
She had crossed the virtual boundary.
Her GPS collar works in merciful stages: first a tone, then a sterner warning, and finally a correction. She had been tempted — by what, I cannot know — and had moved beyond the invisible lines I had set. The correction startled her. She felt exposed. She retreated.
With coaxing, she began to return. Tentatively at first. Then — as she crossed back within the boundary — something changed. The correction ceased. She lifted her head. She transformed again into her joyful, bounding self.
It was not the pasture that had shrunk. It was her freedom that had narrowed.
I saw myself in her.
God has given me a conscience — not a fence, but a living boundary. Within it, there is vast pasture. Outside it, there is not annihilation, but irritation — the prick of truth, the static of guilt.
When tempted I too step outside the line. I rationalize. I test. I graze too near the edge. And when the correction comes — that interior discomfort — I sometimes mistake it for cruelty rather than mercy.
Yet the correction is not punishment. It is invitation.
Even more curious: when I remove the dogs’ collars to recharge them, they do not resist when I place them back on. They come to the meeting spot and sit patiently while I fumble with the latches. They seem to know that the collar does not imprison them — it grants access to the wider pasture.
So it is with Lent.
The disciplines of Lent — fasting, prayer, reflection — are not restrictions that shrink my world. They are collars that open gates. They make possible a freedom that would otherwise dissolve into chaos.
Adam was tempted to become “like God.” Christ was tempted to act like God without obedience.
I am tempted daily to define my own boundaries and call it liberty.
But the desert teaches me this: true freedom is not the absence of lines. It is the presence of love.
3. Contemplatio — Chestertonian Synthesis
Temptation is always a suggestion that we are missing something essential. “If you are the Son of God…” the devil begins — as if sonship required proof.
The genius of Christ in the desert is not that He is untempted. It is that He refuses to redefine Himself under pressure.
The world tempts us with three lies: Bread without trust. Spectacle without surrender. Power without worship.
And each lie whispers that obedience is diminishment.
But obedience enlarges the soul. It keeps us within the pasture where joy runs free.
The paradox is this: the boundary is not the limit of freedom — it is its condition.
Without conscience, I wander. With conscience, I return. With grace, I reign.
The Second Adam succeeds not by grasping, but by trusting.
And so angels minister — not to one who escaped temptation, but to one who endured it.
Examine one boundary I resent and ask whether it protects something sacred.
Refrain from blaming external systems before examining my own choices.
Walk intentionally in communion — not isolation — recognizing that freedom flourishes within relationship.
Synodality is staying within the shared pasture of the Church rather than roaming alone into ideological wilderness.
6. Song Pairing 🎵
🎶 “40 Days” — Matt Maher🎵
The desert is not deprivation; it is preparation. Temptation reveals what we worship.
7. Movie Pairing 🎬
🎬Movie:One Battle After Another (2025)
Spiritual life is not one decisive victory, but endurance through repeated confrontations — temptation resisted becomes character forged.
Introvert + Apostle = Christian paradox unlocked. 🔓 Father Taylor Elzner explains how silence fuels mission, why labels aren’t boxes, and how to stop “communion to escape” and start living grace outward. Grace doesn’t delete your introversion — it perfects it! Introverts aren’t anti-social — we just need better WiFi with Heaven before mingling. This episode is introverted…but we make sure it is apostolic. 🌱
I’m sharing the latest episode of The Introverted Apostle, featuring guest Father Taylor Elzner, and this one struck me deeply. Father Taylor brings not just psychology, but theology to the conversation—looking at introversion through the lens of grace. He speaks about how God doesn’t merely tolerate our temperament; He sanctifies it. That insight alone reframes so much of my own journey. In particular, his reflections helped me understand why I guard my daily morning time of Lectio Divina so fiercely. What I once thought was simply preference may in fact be vocation—a way grace cooperates with silence, reflection, and interiority to bear fruit. If you’ve ever wondered why you are wired the way you are—or how your temperament fits into the life of the Church—this episode is well worth your time.
There is something wonderfully Catholic about meeting an old friend again and discovering he has become something new. The latest episode of CAPN – The WTC: The Podcast does just that. Ruben returns — but now as St. Ann’s Canyon youth director — and though he is young in years, his counsel for Lent is bracingly ancient. Fasting, prayer, sacrifice, intention. No gimmicks. No glitter. Just the sturdy timber of tradition. It is a delightful paradox: the young reminding the old how to walk the old road well. He also speaks plainly about why the CAPN Podcast Network matters for our Diocese — because evangelization today must travel where people are listening. If the Gospel once rode Roman roads, today it rides podcasts. Give it a listen. Whether you are young, seasoned (like me), or somewhere between — you may find Lent calling you deeper than you expected.
My Story
Photo used by permission of Douglas Kirkland/Corbis via Getty Images
Memorial in the Grotto of St. Mary’s Cathedral. The inscription says: “In memory of the death of innocence of the victims of clergy sexual abuse. When innocence dies…a life stops. It is essential that we never forget.“
I was one of “the few” Bishop Zurek spoke of in this letter. He first posted it in August of 2019, and in response to my, “calling out all the more“, he kept reposting it atop the diocesan news page until December 11, 2019. There it remains to this day.
Fr. Ed Graff, brought here from Philadelphia by Bishop Matthiesen, was arrested in 2002 for sexually assaulting a minor and died later that year in jail. Despite the harm linked to his ministry, he was buried in an honored section of Llano Cemetery among our pioneering clergy — a decision that continues to wound survivors and raise hard questions for our diocese.
Bishop Matthiesen, who rode the white horse of public activism even as he brought abusive priests into our diocese such as John Salazar—wounds that still mark us today. I spoke with him often, pleading with him to reconsider his “no regrets” about bringing those priests here…
Bishop Zurek, who told the Diocese of Amarillo he had “no facts” about the Philadelphia report even as Amarillo’s connection to that tragedy was headline news. When I continued to speak out, as Bishop Yanta had once urged me to do, he later wrote that I was not among the faithful and loyal disciples whom the Lord Jesus desires.
